BLACK UKRAINIAN WARRIORS? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

With US President Donald Trump hitting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky with a $500 billion tab for the country’s resources, let’s have a look at one of the videos from the early days of the three-year war in Ukraine.

As Pyra Diantouadi from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) said in this viral 1 March 2022 video, Ukrainian authorities attempted to coax Africans to fight for it against Russia. He wondered why Africans would get involved, given the heightened risk Africans would be exposed to on the frontlines in a war that didn’t concern them. However, recruitment was not limited to inside Ukraine. After Zelensky made a global call for volunteers, some Africans reportedly flocked to Ukrainian embassies throughout Africa to sign up. They were turned away because their respective governments rejected the Ukrainian call. In Senegal, the government ordered the Ukrainian ambassador to remove a Facebook post that had called for volunteers. As it was, Ukrainian authorities’ racist treatment of Africans trying to flee Ukraine did little to inspire support.

Africans have historically been used to fight in European wars, whether it was in the US war on Vietnam, the two World Wars some historians refer to as imperialist wars, the US Civil War or US settler-colonisers’ war of ‘independence’ against the British. Our people, unfortunately, have a history of fighting for people who would never fight for us. But, at least this brother followed in the steps of boxer and activist Muhammad Ali, who refused to be deployed to Vietnam in 1967, essentially saying, ‘Hell no!’

Video credit: @ABCnews

Sources

https://www.newsweek.com/putin-west-us-ukrainians-cannon-fodder-war-1765928

https://time.com/7260890/zelensky-minerals-deal-trump-us-ukraine-peace-negotiations

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-60712913